Sunday, January 13, 2008

“This Whole Thing” is the New “Is!”

After being criticized for comparing the Barack Obama campaign to a “fairy tale” in the speech shown above, Bill Clinton called Al Sharpton’s radio show to deny that he was talking about the campaign itself, insisting that he was only referring to Obama’s position on the Iraq war.

But listen to the original statement carefully. After a rambling critique of the media’s reaction to Obama’s position on the war, including a series of actions attributed to Obama, Clinton ended the tirade with the following statement:

“This whole thing is the biggest fairy tale I’ve ever seen!”

If you ask me, it sounds like Bill was playing clever word games in order to deliberately say one thing, while giving himself plausible deniability of the intentions behind his statement.

After listening, do you think “this whole thing” wasn’t carefully selected to sound one way, while allowing Bill to deny that meaning if he was called on it?

Frankly, I’m surprised that Bill, while talking to Sharpton, didn’t wag his finger in the direction of some random person and declare:

“I never suggested that man has no business thinking he could be President of the United States!”

I also find it a bit ironic that this tactic is being used against Obama, whose campaign is largely based on a promise “to be straight with the American people,” and whose actions so far seem remarkably consistent with that promise (Hey, he’s even capable of admitting that he inhaled!)

Listening to Bill twist his words to manipulate his audience is just another reminder of why we need real change from the old style politics of rhetorical deception!